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Do use to chaunt it; it is silly sooth 2,
And dallies with the innocence of love 3,
Like the old age*.

CLO. Are you ready, sir?

DUKE. Ay; pr'ythee, sing.

SONG.

CLO. Come away, come away, death,
And in sad cypress let me be laid3 ;
Fly away, fly away, breath;
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.

[Musick.

I once thought, that free meant here- not having yet surrendered their liberty to man ;-unmarried.'

Free, however, may only mean cheerful. So, in Othello :

"I slept the next night well: was free and merry." Again, in Macbeth :

"Be free and jovial with thy guests to-night."

"Fair and free," Mr. Warton observes, is in the metrical romances a common appellation for a lady. Warton's Milt. p. 38. Chaucer, the same ingenious writer observes, applies this epithet to married women, which is adverse to the explication I had first given :

"Rise up, my wife, my love, my lady, free." March. T. v. 1655. Urr. "So Jonson makes his beautiful Countess of Bedford to be 'fair, and free, and wise.' Epigrams, lxxvi." MALONE.

Is not free, unreserved, uncontrolled by the restraints of female delicacy, forward, and such as sing plain songs?' HENLEY. The precise meaning of this epithet cannot very easily be pointed out. Chaucer, Drayton, Ben Jonson, and many other poets, employ the epithet free, with little certainty of meaning.. Free, in the instance before us, may commodiously signify, "artless, free from art, uninfluenced by artificial manners, undirected by false refinement in their choice of ditties." STEEVENS.

2- silly sooth,] It is plain, simple truth. JOHNSON.

3 And DALLIES with the innocence of love,] To dally is to play, to trifle. So, Act III.: "They that dally nicely with words." Again, in Swetnam Arraign'd, 1620:

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"Dallied with danger."

Again, in Sir W. D'Avenant's Albovine, 1629:

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"Why dost thou dally thus with feeble motion?"

STEEVENS.

the OLD AGE.] The old age is the ages past, the times of simplicity. JOHNSON.

My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
O, prepare it;

My part of death no one so true
Did share it'.

5 And in sad CYPRESS let me be laid;] In the books of our author's age the thin transparent lawn called cyprus, which was formerly used for scarfs and hatbands at funerals, was, I believe, constantly spelt cypress. So, in The Winter's Tale, edit.

1623 : .

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Cypresse black as e'er was crow-," where undoubtedly cyprus was meant. So again, in the play before us, edit. 1623, (as Mr. Warton has observed)

66

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a cypresse, not a bosom, Hides my heart."

See also Minsheu's Dict. in v.

curled linen."

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"Cypres or Cypress, a fine

It is from the context alone therefore that we can ascertain whether cyprus or cypress was intended by our old writers. Mr. Warton has suggested in his late edition of Milton's Poems, that the meaning here is,— Let me be laid in a shroud made of cyprus, not in a coffin made of cypress wood." But in a subsequent line of this song the shroud, (like that of Polonius) we find, is white. There was indeed white cyprus as well as black; but the epithet sad is inconsistent with white, and therefore I suppose the wood to have been here meant.

Coffins being frequently made of cypress wood, (perhaps in consequence of cyprus being used at funerals) the epithet sad is here employed with strict propriety. "King Richard the Second (says Speed) was so affected by the death of his favourite Robert de Vere, duke of Ireland, that he commanded the cypress chest wherein his body lay embalmed, to be opened, that he might see and handle it." The king attended his funeral. MALONE.

"And in sad cypress let me be laid." i. e. in a shroud of cypress or cyprus. Thus Autolycus, in The Winter's Tale: "Lawn as white as driven snow,

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There was both black and white cyprus, as there is still black and white crape; and ancient shrouds were always made of the latter. STEEVENS. copy reads-Fie away. The

6 FLY away, FLY away,] The old emendation is Mr. Rowe's. MALONE. My part of death no one so true Did share it.] Though death is a part in which every one

acts his share, yet of all these actors no one is so true as I.

JOHNSON.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
On my black coffin let there be strown;
Not a friend, not a friend greet

My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown:
A thousand thousand sighs to save,
Lay me, O, where

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Sad true lover never find my grave,
To weep there.

DUKE. There's for thy pains.

CLO. No pains, sir; I take pleasure in singing, sir.

DUKE. I'll pay thy pleasure then.

CLO. Truly, sir, and pleasure will be paid, one time or another.

DUKE. Give me now leave to leave thee.

CLO. Now, the melancholy god protect thee; and the tailor make thy doublet of changeable taffata, for thy mind is a very opal'!-I would

Sad true LOVER-] Mr. Pope rejected the word sad, and other modern editors have unnecessarily changed true lover totrue love. By making never one syllable the metre is preserved. Since this note was written, I have observed that lover is elsewhere used by our poet as a word of one syllable. So, in A Midsummer Night's Dream:

"Tie up my lover's tongue; bring him in silently." Again, in King Henry VIII.:

"Is held no great good lover of the Archbishop's." There is perhaps, therefore, no need of abbreviating the word never in this line. MALONE.

I

In the instance produced from A Midsummer Night's Dream, suppose lover to be a misprint for love; and in K. Henry VIII. I know not why it should be considered as a monosyllable.

STEEVENS.

9-a very OPAL!] A precious stone of almost all colours.

So, Milton, describing the walls of heaven :

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"With opal tow'rs, and battlements adorn'd." The opal is a gem which varies its appearance as it is viewed in different lights. Thus, in The Muses' Elizium, by Drayton :

have men of such constancy put to sea, that their business might be every thing, and their intent every where'; for that's it, that always makes a good voyage of nothing.-Farewell. [Exit Clown. DUKE. Let all the rest give place.――

[Exeunt CURIO and Attendants.
Once more, Cesario,

Get thee to yon' same sovereign cruelty :
Tell her, my love, more noble than the world,
Prizes not quantity of dirty lands;

The parts that fortune hath bestow'd upon her,
Tell her, I hold as giddily as fortune;
But 'tis that miracle, and queen of gems,
That nature pranks her in 2, attracts my soul.

"With opals more than any one
"We'll deck thine altar fuller,
"For that of every precious stone
"It doth retain some colour."

"In the opal, (says P. Holland's translation of Pliny's Natural History, b. xxxvii. c. 6,) you shall see the burning fire of the carbuncle or rubie, the glorious purple of the amethyst, the green sea of the emeraud, and all glittering together mixed after an incredible manner." STEEVENS.

1 — that their business might be every thing, and their intent EVERY where;] Both the preservation of the antithesis, and the recovery of the sense, require we should read,-" and their intent no where." Because a man who suffers himself to run with every wind, and so makes his business every where, cannot be said to have any intent; for that word signifies a determination of the mind to something. Besides, the conclusion of making a good voyage of nothing, directs to this emendation. WARBURTON.

An intent every where, is much the same as an intent no where, as it hath no one particular place more in view than another.

HEATH.

The present reading is preferable to Warburton's amendment. We cannot accuse a man of inconstancy who has no intents at all, though we may the man whose intents are every where; that is, are continually varying. M. MASON.

2 But 'tis that miracle, and queen of gems,

That nature pranks her IN,] What is "that miracle, and

Vio. But, if she cannot love you, sir?
DUKE. I cannot be so answer'd 3.

3

VIO.
'Sooth, but you must.
Say, that some lady, as, perhaps, there is,
Hath for your love as great a pang of heart
As you have for Olivia: you cannot love her;
You tell her so; Must she not then be answer'd?
DUKE. There is no woman's sides,

Can bide the beating of so strong a passion
As love doth give my heart: no woman's heart
So big, to hold so much: they lack retention.
Alas, their love may be call'd appetite,–
No motion of the liver, but the palate,-
That suffer surfeit, cloyment, and revolt 1 ;

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queen of gems ? we are not told in this reading. Besides, what is meant by 'nature pranking her in a miracle? 'We should read: "But 'tis that miracle, and queen

"That nature pranks, her mind

of

"

gems,

i. e. what attracts my soul, is not her fortune, but her mind, that miracle and queen of gems that nature pranks, i. e. sets out, adorns. WARBURTON.

The miracle and queen of gems is her beauty, which the commentator might have found without so emphatical an enquiry. As to her mind, he that should be captious would say, that though it may be formed by nature, it must be pranked by education.

Shakspeare does not say that nature pranks her in a miracle, but in the miracle of gems, that is, in a gem miraculously beautiful. JOHNSON.

To prank is to deck out, to adorn. See Lye's Etymologicon. HEATH.

So, in The Winter's Tale :

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and me,

"Most goddess-like, prank'd up-." STEEVENS.

3 I cannot be so answer'd.] The folio reads-" It cannot be," &c. STEEVENS.

The correction was made by Sir Thomas Hanmer. I am not sure that it is necessary, though it has been adopted in the late editions. The Duke may mean, 'My suit cannot be so answered.' MALONE.

4 Alas, their love may be call'd appetite, &c.

That suffer surfeit, cloyment, and revolt;] The duke has 'changed his opinion of women very suddenly. It was but a few

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